4 Tips for Styling Low Porosity Hair

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Tired of having wet frizzy matted results after you have worked so hard to style your hair? Use these styling tips for low porosity hair!

There was a time where I thought I could not set my hair in twists, braids, or rollers after it had been freshly washed. I would spend time loading up my hair with product that I thought would keep it moisturized and after hours of hard work, I was repaid with crispy shriveled up results. Worst of all, I would set my hair in the evening and by the next morning, it still was somewhat wet, which led to frizz when I would undo my set.

This is because I have low porosity hair and if you are experiencing anything like what I described above, you could possibly have low porosity hair too.

When you have low porosity hair it is a challenge getting moisture into your strands because your cuticles lay flat. What ends up happening is all the moisture ends up just sitting on top of your hair (which is why it many cases your hair seems like it takes forever to dry). The good news is, once you successfully get moisture into your hair, it retains really well.

Fear not! There are simple solutions to getting the style results that you desire if you happen to be a low porosity natural:

Style damp hair and avoid styling saturated hair

It is beneficial to style damp hair rather than saturated hair to avoid breakage. When your hair is wet, it is in its weakest state while on the other hand, dry hair is more of a challenge to manipulate; damp hair provides the perfect medium. For the low porosity natural, it is even more critical that excess water be removed to avoid wet head the next day.

Use medium or small sections rather than large

When you plait your hair, it already enables it to retain more moisture than if it were left out, so if you do really large sections it may not have enough breathing room to dry the way you would like it.

Use products that are on the lighter side

When you use products that are too heavy, they end up creating a layer of buildup and they don’t absorb into your hair. It’s no wonder that when I tried ORS Styling Foam that it worked better than the vast majority of butters that I have tried, the butters were simply just too heavy for my hair. The foam was light enough to penetrate and gave me the hold that I needed.

Try products with humectants

Especially in the winter, you may need that extra moisture so if you use a butter, go with one that contains a humectant. For some reason, humectants like glycerin get a bad rep but for the low porosity natural they can be heaven-sent. They help the moisture get inside your strands rather than just laying on top of it. In humid weather, they can make your hair feel sticky because it can lure moisture from the air into your hair. Otherwise humectants work amazingly well with low porosity hair. A product that I found to be on the heavier side that contained glycerin still did a great job. It is most likely because the glycerin helped the product penetrate rather than sit on top of my hair.